


Sleepover

by diebrando



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: M/M, i feel the need to cry every time i think of or see shizuo, not angst nor fluff but something in between, shizuo's anger issues and consequent self-loathing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:35:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27672778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diebrando/pseuds/diebrando
Summary: “What a nice apartment you have,” Izaya says. “Very cozy.”“If you are going to stay here, at least stay quiet,” Shizuo answers, taking a gulp of milk straight from the carton. “I will kill you in the morning.”Or; how Izaya's circumstances forced him to take up residence on Shizuo's couch.
Relationships: Heiwajima Shizuo/Orihara Izaya
Comments: 2
Kudos: 47





	Sleepover

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure what this is. The deadline for my thesis is approaching rapidly. Nevertheless, you'll probably be hearing from me soon enough.

Despite what everyone seems to think, Shizuo doesn’t want anyone dead, or even hurt. His instincts might want that, sure, but he himself does not.

He had an alright day. Not good, but not bad neither; none of the customers had given him that much trouble, and although a couple of guys fought back, they were quick to give it up and were left at their doorsteps without their money and previous good mood. He had a nice dinner with Tom and Vorona, and as he had returned home, he found himself smiling to himself.

So, when it’s dark out and he hears a knock on his door, it’s reasonable to think that it might be just the thing to break his peace. Nobody ever visits him, especially on midnight, expect people with bad news or worse intentions.

The floor is cold under his bare feet as he steps his way to the door through the dim room. Nothing can be heard behind the door, and with an irritated breath, he cracks the door open.

Immediately, he wants to close it. He is greeted by a cutting smile, dark eyes, and a headache that makes him see red.

Shizuo feels his hand twitching as everything in his body screams for him to slam him through the wall, to get him out of his sight, but to his credit, he manages a calm breath. “The hell are you doing here?”

Izaya’s hands raise up in surrender. “Just let me in, Shizu-chan.”

“I won’t,” he answers and immediately goes to close the door, but Izaya is faster. He slips under Shizuo’s arm and before Shizuo can realize what’s happening, Izaya is in his apartment, like a slippery snake, getting everywhere he wants.

There is no reading Izaya’s intentions as all his emotions are concealed behind a mask as always, but Shizuo can see his movements being a bit more frantic and sloppy than usual – it makes him falter, which is more than enough time for Izaya to slip further away from him.

Izaya’s eyes are sharp on his. “Let me stay here for the night, will you?”

What gave Izaya the idea that he has the right to ask anything of him?

“Get out,” Shizuo says calmly, taking a step towards him.

“At least hear me out.”

“I said,” Shizuo says as he takes another step, “get out.”

For a brief moment, Izaya’s face goes blank – it’s like a loading screen, Shizuo thinks, during which all his masks are taken off as he shuffles them, contemplating which one he should use next. Like switching stations, only static behind his eyes.

His previous smirk quickly changes into a look of sadness, its goal to evoke pity in Shizuo. It only makes the rage at the bottom of his stomach flare up, as the scorn behind the mask of sadness on Izaya’s face is as clear as a day.

Izaya’s hand slips inside his coat. “Afraid I will hurt you?” he says, staring into his eyes, as his deft fingers go through the pockets. He removes two folding knives and drops them to the floor before Shizuo’s feet. “See? I’m unarmed.”

Shizuo couldn’t care less about the knives. He’s seething with anger, his instincts ready to bash Izaya’s head in and throw him out, preferably under a truck.

“I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t necessary. I played around with the wrong people. This is the last place they would try to find me. If I were to go home now, it would surely be a suicide.”

He doesn’t know what Izaya is trying to get out of explaining all these meaningless things to him. It’s all forgotten as soon as Izaya closes his mouth, the only words echoing in his head being _suicide_ and _wrong people_ and _finally, he’s dying._

“You think I care? Get out.”

Izaya frowns. “You don’t have to be so repetitive.”

The rage finally overpowers all Shizuo’s other senses, blurring his vision. He grabs ahold of the front of Izaya’s shirt and slams him into the wall. Izaya groans but keeps on smiling sadly, his feet hanging above the floor.

Shizuo can feel Izaya’s pulse under his shaking hand, beating quick and steady. “I’m tired, Izaya. I’m too tired for your games right now.”

“I know. So, just let me stay here, will you? I won’t be in your way.”

“You sure as hell will be in my way. Just the thought of you lying around here pisses me off.”

“My, you flatter me,” Izaya says. His eyes won’t leave Shizuo’s, and in the dimness of the entryway his eyes have a distinct sparkle in them, a look that he can’t look away from. “Won’t you let me down?”

Shizuo grits his teeth, not moving an inch. “No. I’ll throw you through the door right this second.”

“I will just come back if you do that, Shizu-chan.”

“Don’t call me that. I’ve said that already.”

“Have I already told you how repetitive you are? I’m getting bored. Don’t you want to go to sleep? I sure would. It’s getting cold, too,” Izaya sighs and tilts his head as much as he can in Shizuo’s tight hold. He glances at the door which was left open. “The warmth is seeping out.”

“Don’t you ever shut up? Should I squeeze your throat tighter?”

“Am I remembering incorrectly, or did you use to say you hate violence? With how you are acting, I can hardly believe that you truly think that. Such a beast, Shizu-chan.”

The mask changes again. The sadness is gone, replaced by an ugly sneer.

Shizuo squeezes tighter, and grins as Izaya grimaces in pain. “You’re the one doing this to me.”

Izaya’s teeth flash, and Shizuo knows he’s lost when he answers him.

“I don’t think so.”

The calm, cold words freeze him. He feels his anger dissipating, the hazy edges of his vision clearing off – suddenly, he sees more clearly, feels more clearly, and desperately, he tries to connect with the logical part of his brain. _Calm down, calm down._

Against all odds, he does manage to calm down. He even manages to agree with Izaya. After all, Shizuo is definitely the one strangling Izaya, not the other way around.

Izaya has not done anything to him. _Yet_ , he thinks. He shakes his head, getting rid of the suspicious thoughts, trying to force himself to give him the benefit of the doubt.

His grip on Izaya’s shirt falters, and slowly, he lowers Izaya to the ground. Saying nothing, he slams the front door closed and picks up the folding knives, feeling the weight of Izaya’s cold, calculating eyes boring into his back.

Back in the living room, he makes a straight line to the window. Cold air hits his face as he opens it wide and throws the blades out, metal clinking against the wet asphalt as they land.

As he goes to the fridge to grab a carton of milk, he sees Izaya stepping into the room. Without so much as taking in his surroundings, he sits on the couch and removes his coat, letting it drop on the floor. Shizuo has a terrifying thought that he’s been here before.

“What a nice apartment you have,” Izaya says after a while. He looks around the room, humming. “Very cozy.”

“If you are going to stay here, at least stay quiet,” Shizuo says, taking a gulp of milk straight from the carton. “I will kill you in the morning.”

Izaya smiles as an answer. “Thank you for the warning.”

Shizuo doesn’t smile. He gestures to the window, grim. “Were those all the blades you had on you?”

“Yes,” Izaya says. He spreads his arms and leans back on the couch, continuing, “But please, do look through my body for more.”

“Hell no.”

His gaze goes to the coat lying on the floor. It’s a sad looking lump of black fabric and fur, a bit dirty from the rain and hazy city air, and probably a fight or two. He walks to it, ignoring the look Izaya is throwing him, and picks it up. As he’s going through its pockets, he says, “This thing is suspicious, though.”

Izaya hums. “Go ahead. Have a look.”

“Didn’t ask for your permission.”

Inside the pockets – both the visible, bigger ones, and the hidden ones in the inner layer – Shizuo finds two phones, a box of matches, a travel card, a few coins, and keys. He has an urge to throw them out of the window like he did to the blades, especially the keys, but instead he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Having thrown all the items on the floor, he stuffs them back into the pockets.

“Find anything interesting?” Izaya asks on the couch, a playful tint in his voice.

“No,” he answers, dropping the coat to the floor. He starts to walk to the bathroom. “Don’t you dare do anything.”

“Anything? Harsh.”

Shizuo stops and glares at him over his shoulder. “Yes.”

Izaya raises his brows, an innocent, fake-surprised expression on his face. Shizuo feels his nails digging into the flesh of his palms. Izaya raises his hands and lets out a sarcastic hum. “Okay, okay.”

In the bathroom, Shizuo lets his shoulders sag, the tension in his muscles easing off. As he thought, the day had been too peaceful – so peaceful that something was bound to happen. And it did. From the mirror, his tired eyes are staring back at him.

People have told him that he’s expressive, especially when angry. He has never felt so. His eyes are bland, emotionless pools of brown when he looks at them, the dim light of the bathroom not flattering in the least.

On the other hand, he has never seen himself in the mirror while angry. Usually all mirrors have already been shattered when he finally manages to calm himself down, and the blood sprinkled all over the reflective surfaces of the shattered pieces of glass makes it unable for him to see the look of pain on his face afterwards. The calm after the storm was always the worst.

He brushes his teeth, lazily, and splashes cold water to his face. Maybe the only emotion he can ever feel is anger, the other emotional parts of his brain shut off.

When he comes back, Izaya is lying on the couch on his back, his eyes closed. They open as Shizuo enters the room.

“You don’t happen to have a spare toothbrush, do you? A clean one, preferably,” Izaya says, his cheek resting against the armrest. Then, he sighs. “Ah, a bath would be nice, too.”

Shizuo feels his pulse quickening. He closes his eyes. “See if I care. Your teeth can rot. That would keep your mouth shut for once.”

He walks past him towards his bedroom, his safe place, or at least a place where he can pretend that the flea is not under the same roof as him. He wants nothing more than to leave the conversation, but, of course, Izaya is a bastard.

“Hey, Shizu-chan – I wonder, have you ever been nice even once in your life?”

Shizuo grits his teeth. He tries to force his legs to keep walking, but it’s futile. The lure of Izaya’s annoying voice is too strong, making it impossible to ignore him. “To you, no.”

“Hmm. I see. That is true. I have seen you act very gentlemanly towards others, especially the Transporter. And the Russian girl. Ah, I wonder, is this some sort of chivalry I am sensing?” he pauses, muttering to himself. “Yes, yes, that makes sense. You don’t want to be rude to girls. Although I am not sure if there is anything else to it.”

“The hell? What have Celty and Vorona got anything to do with this?” Shizuo scoffs. He turns towards Izaya, the bedroom forgotten. “Mind your own business, flea. I’ll throw you out.”

While Shizuo was in the bathroom, Izaya had made himself way too comfortable in his apartment. He was settled on the couch with a smug smile on his face, burrowed cozily between the pillows with his phone laying on top of his chest. Shizuo was already thinking of buying a new couch, as this one could probably never recover from the stench of him, ruined forever.

Izaya let out a lazy smile and turned back to his phone. “Haven’t we already established that I’ll just come back here whether you throw me out or not?”

Shizuo is left standing there, staring at Izaya, whose attention is shifted now completely to his phone.

Whatever.

Slowly, his anger gives away to tiredness. Without saying anything, he turns away and leaves to the bedroom.

*

Shizuo is lying in bed, unable to sleep.

He did fall asleep at some point, but woke up soon after, restless and sweaty. He blinks up at the ceiling. He tries not to focus on the uncomfortable way the blanket is sticking onto his skin, or on the tight feeling in his chest, like his heart is being squeezed, derived from oxygen. He tries not to think of Izaya, probably sleeping on the other side of the wall. Of how easy it would be to get rid of him, once and for all.

He hopes he hasn’t done anything with his apartment. He didn’t stop to think about it when he let him stay here, but fortunately, there is nothing of value to steal or destroy.

Eventually, he gets up and walks to the kitchen – to get water, he says to himself.

There he is, still. Izaya is lying on his back, his face leaning sideways towards the room. Knees slightly bent, other arm hanging from the couch and a lax look on his face, Izaya looks almost human. The dark circles under his eyes are accented by the moonlight illuminating his ghostly face.

A conversation he had with Shinra a year or so ago comes back to him, suddenly. He had been sitting in Shinra and Celty’s apartment, fuming with rage after an encounter with Izaya, cursing out loud.

_Shinra stood before him, scratching his forehead. “Have you ever thought of why he acts like that?”_

_“I have. He’s an asshole and wants to make my life a living hell,” he answered._

_“True,” Shinra said. He leaned against the wall, taking a sip of his coffee, and then gesturing to Shizuo with the cup. “Why is it only you he seems to make a target of, though?”_

_Shizuo scoffed. “It’s something about me being a monster. Is this getting somewhere?”_

_“Ah, now we’re on the right topic,” he answered cheerfully. “You’re not the only monster in Ikebukuro. See, Celty here is no human, and neither is Ruri-chan, nor even Anri-chan. Why isn’t he trying to kill them as actively as you?”_

_Shizuo had not thought of that, but neither did he ever want to. He mainly wanted to storm off the building, but as he glanced at Celty sitting beside him, even she seemed to be deep in thought. The room was filled with contemplative silence, and it was clear that Shizuo’s input was needed._

_Calming his nerves, he sighed. Shrugged. “I don’t know. Chivalry?”_

_Shinra let out a laugh. “God, no. What I think is this,” he said, starting to pace around the room. “You’re very easy to get a reaction out of, and taunting you gives him joy. But what makes me wonder is why does he keep doing it? Hasn’t he already had enough of your predictable reactions? The answer to that, I think, is that he still cannot predict how you will react even after watching you for so long. He keeps getting back because he cannot understand you.”_

_Shinra stopped to take a breath, turning his crazy eyes at him. “Don’t you find that funny? You’re one of the easiest people to understand when you get angry, and Izaya is supposed to be very perspective. So, either he is expecting other kind of reaction than anger from you – which is impossible to achieve with his methods, so let’s eliminate that possibility – or he just genuinely cannot understand you. So, my hypothesis is this: it is not you that Izaya cannot understand, but the feelings he has for you.”_

_Shizuo stared at him. Most of the speech hadn’t even entered his brain. One word had stuck, though. “Feelings?”_

_“Yes,” Shinra smiled. “This has been on my mind for a while, but it’s possible he has feelings for you that differ from how he feels for other people. And the thing is, I don’t think it’s pure hatred.”_

Shizuo had almost punched him in the face then and there, as the idea was so ridiculous, but was stopped by Celty’s hand on his arm.

It still is ridiculous. People talk about love and hate being two sides of the same coin, but he thinks those kinds of people have never known what true hatred feels like.

He stops. Quiet on his feet, he retrieves his phone from the bedroom.

Before he starts to hesitate on what is it exactly that he’s doing, he lifts the phone up. Despite the darkness, Izaya’s sleeping form is recognizable on the screen. His face is mostly hidden in the shadows, but the way his dark hair is spilled onto his forehead and the slight furrow is his brows is visible.

Quickly, he snaps a picture.

It looks good. Looks cute, even – maybe he could use it as blackmail material against him.

Izaya shifts and groans in his sleep. It alerts him, making his heart jump in his chest, and he flees back to the bedroom, feeling like a thief in his own apartment.

Back in his bed, he checks the picture again. He feels his pulse quicken, but surprisingly, it doesn’t feel as uncomfortable as when he’s angry.

*

When he wakes up again, this time in the morning, it’s like nothing happened. Izaya is gone, and there is no sign of him ever being there. For a moment, Shizuo thinks he dreamed it all, but when he takes a a deep breath, the stench in the air is unmistakable.

He grunts, lighting up a cigarette. _Damn him._

He has no idea what happened yesterday, but he will not be fooled twice.


End file.
